The science trust dividend: enabling innovation and adoption

Published on April 2nd, 2026

Trust in science is not a byproduct of progress. It is a prerequisite for it.

At a moment when decisions across AI, climate, health, and energy carry systemic and long-term consequences, the credibility of scientific evidence is increasingly shaping whether innovation is adopted, delayed, or rejected. This invitation-only breakfast, held under Chatham House rules at the Frontiers Science House in Davos, created space for a more candid exchange on how trust is built, maintained, and, in some cases, eroded.

The discussion made clear that trust cannot be treated as a communications challenge alone. It is embedded in systems: in how research is funded, how data is shared, how evidence is validated, and how institutions interact with society. Participants emphasized that in high-stakes environments, trust functions as a form of infrastructure, enabling decisions to move forward with confidence across sectors and borders.

A central theme was shared responsibility. Trust in science is shaped not only by researchers, but by governments, industry, media, and civil society. Transparency, open science, and integrity in communication were identified as foundational conditions, ensuring that knowledge remains both credible and usable. At the same time, participants acknowledged that these principles are increasingly tested by a fragmented information landscape, where misinformation can spread faster than evidence.

The conversation also pointed to a deeper structural tension. Incentives across institutions are often misaligned with long-term trust building, and efforts to counter misinformation remain uneven. Strengthening trust therefore requires coordinated approaches that go beyond messaging, integrating governance, funding, and accountability mechanisms across the scientific ecosystem.

What emerged was a clear shift in perspective: trust in science is not simply about public confidence, but about the reliability of the systems that connect knowledge to decision-making. As scientific complexity grows, so too does the need to deliberately design those systems to ensure that evidence can effectively guide action in an increasingly uncertain world. 

Key takeaways

• Trust functions as critical infrastructure for decision-making in high-stakes domains such as AI, climate, and health

• Transparency and open science are essential to ensure evidence is credible, accessible, and actionable

• Current institutional incentives are not aligned with long-term trust building

• Misinformation and fragmented information ecosystems weaken the link between evidence and action

• Cross-sector coordination is required to sustain a resilient and reliable knowledge system

Please join the conversation and share your perspective.

Copyright: © 2026 [author(s)]. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in the Frontiers Policy Labs is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.